The fictional universe of Star Wars Poster Alternate meaning: Strategic Defense Initiative This article is about the Star Wars saga and franchise in general. For the first original 1977 movie initially released with that name, see Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope Star Wars is the name of a series of science fantasy... Star Wars is a multilingual one, in which it is common to have either a passive or active understanding of many multiple languages from numerous alien races and cultures.

Common languages

The language spoken most often by beings in the Star Wars galaxy is Galactic Basic (shortened to Basic) although this name itself is never explicitly mentioned in the films themselves. According to This article is about traditional role-playing games. See video and computer role-playing games for their digital counterparts. A role-playing game (RPG) is a type of game where players assume the roles of fictional characters via role-playing. In fact, many non-athletic games involve some aspect of... Role-playing game sources, Galactic Basic is a An artificial or constructed language (known colloquially as a conlang among aficionados), is a language whose vocabulary and grammar were specifically devised by an individual or small group, rather than having naturally evolved as part of a culture as with natural languages. Some are designed for use in human communication... constructed language created from a mixing of the various native languages of the founding members of the The Republic is not what it once was. The Senate is full of greedy, squabbling delegates. There is no interest in the common good. - Senator Palpatine Form of Government Federal Republic Official language Basic Capital Coruscant Head of Government Chancellor Establishment c. 25,000 BBY Currency Galactic Standard Credit (Republic... Galactic Republic, including the ... Duros, the ... Bothans and In George Lucas fictional Star Wars universe, Humans are the most numerous and dominant species, with apparently millions of major and minor colonies galaxywide. Humans In the Star Wars universe, Humans were one of the first species to develop the hyperdrive, Corellians the first to do so. By this time... Humans.

For practicality in the films and literature, Galactic Basic is almost identical to the language of publication (In most cases the original material is modern The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. It is the third most common first language (native speakers), with around 402 million people in 2002. English has lingua franca status in many parts of the world, due to the military, economic, scientific, political and cultural influence... English). In the English versions of the films, Imperial officers usually speak with Received Pronunciation (RP) is a form of pronunciation of the English language, usually defined as the educated spoken English of southeastern England. This is a prescriptivist point-of-view — it is quite possible for an intelligent, educated individual to use a non-standard dialect. According to the Fowlers... RP-like upper-class British accents, as well as some of the Jedi, including General Obi-Wan Ben Kenobi (57 - 0 BBY) was a Jedi Master, of legendary status, in the fictional Star Wars universe. He taught both Anakin and Luke Skywalker in the ways of the Force. In Episodes IV through VI, Kenobi was played by Sir Alec Guinness. In the prequels, Episodes... Obi Wan Kenobi and Qui-Gon Jinn (92 BBY - 32 BBY) was a Jedi Master and Master of Obi-Wan Kenobi in the fictional Star Wars universe. Qui-Gon is played by Liam Neeson in The Phantom Menace. He doesnt appear in other films, unless one counts his voice in Attack of the... Qui-Gon Jinn. The majority of the Rebels and most other humans, however, have Standard Midwestern or General American is a notional accent of American English based on speech patterns common in the Midwest of the United States and those used by many American network television broadcasters. The Standard Midwestern pronunciation and dialect is not thought of as a standard pronunciation, but is used... American accents. Non-humans speaking Basic often also have accents, sometimes reminiscent of others found on Earth. The The Trade Federation is a fictional organization that exists in the Star Wars universe at the time of the Galactic Republic. It was founded in 350 BBY. The Trade Federation invasion force marches on Theed Shortly before The Phantom Menace, Nute Gunray became the viceroy of the Trade Federation. He... Trade Federation viceroys, for example, appear to speak When used as an adjective, Chinese refers to anything that originates from China, e.g., Chinese cuisine. When the word is used as a noun, it means one of the following: the Chinese language, either in general or specifically Chinese written language, Chinese spoken languages or Standard Mandarin; Chinese people... Chinese-accented English, the Toydarian Watto speaks with a Yiddish (ייִדיש, Jiddisch) is a Germanic language spoken by about four million Jews throughout the world. The name Yiddish itself means Jewish (German: Jüdisch, Swedish: Jiddisch) and is most probably originally short for yidish-taytsh (ייִדיש - טיַ... Yiddish accent and Jar Jar Binks (born c. 50 BBY) is a fictional character in the Star Wars movies The Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones, and the yet to be released Revenge of the Sith. His primary role was to be comic relief--based on his gangly way of walking, and his... Jar Jar Binks' accent and dialect is possibly derived from Caribbean English is a dialect of the English language spoken in the Caribbean. In the Caribbean, there is a great deal of variation in the way English is spoken. Examples of the English in daily use in the Caribbean include a reduced set of pronouns, typically, me, we, he, she... Caribbean English.

It is worth noting that languages in the Star Wars universe are not always tied to specific species, just as in the real world languages are not always tied to specific nations or races, but can become the native language of a separate population. Notable dialects of Basic include the This is a list of species and races from the fictional universe of Star Wars. Abyssin This species has been most often described as primitive and violent, and are often hired as petty thugs should one travel off-world. They inhabit the planet Byss and are a nomadic race. At... Gungans of Naboo is a planet in the fictional Star Wars universe. Located in the Chommell sector, Naboo is the home planet of Queen Amidala and Jar Jar Binks, as well as Senator (later Chancellor and then Emperor) Palpatine. In The Phantom Menace, it was the site of a blockade by the... Naboo's A Pidgin, or contact language, is the name given to any language created, usually spontaneously, out of a mixture of other languages as a means of communication between speakers of different tongues. Pidgins have rudimentary grammars and restricted vocabulary, serving as auxiliary contact languages. They are improvised rather than learned... pidgin dialect of Galactic Basic (though they do also have a native tongue), and Master Yoda is a fictional character in the Star Wars universe. Yoda is Sanskrit for warrior. Spoiler warning: Plot or ending details follow. Background Yoda (896 BBY - 4 ABY), standing only 2 foot 1 inch (0.66 metres), is arguably the most powerful Jedi Master in Star Wars and one... Yoda's unusual dialect of Basic in which sentences follow an OSV order, rather than the more usual SVO is an acronym for several terms: SVO denotes the sequence Subject Verb Object in Linguistic typology. In the insurance industry it stands for Securities Valuation Office. Straight Vegetable Oil. The IATA Airport Code for Sheremetyevo International Airport Fords performance subsidiary called Special Vehicle Operations. This is a disambiguation... SVO. It is unknown if this is a dialect spoken by all members of Yoda's species, or whether it was a quirk only Yoda possessed.

Another Lingua franca, literally Frankish language in Italian, was originally a mixed language consisting largely of Italian plus a vocabulary drawn from Turkish, Persian, French, Greek and Arabic and used for communication throughout the Middle East. The term is now applied to any language used by speakers of different languages to... lingua franca in the Star Wars Universe that is spoken by many groups and species is Huttese, most notably spoken on In George Lucass Star Wars saga, Tatooine is the home planet of the Skywalker family and the setting for much of the action in the sagas films (as well as several of the novels and other pieces of written fiction). The planet is not actually named in Star... Tatooine. The name Huttese suggests that it was created by the This is a list of species and races from the fictional universe of Star Wars. Abyssin This species has been most often described as primitive and violent, and are often hired as petty thugs should one travel off-world. They inhabit the planet Byss and are a nomadic race. At... Hutt species and adopted by other races, most probably those involved in business with the Hutts such as the ... Rodians. It is spoken in the films by both non-humans ( Jabba Desilijic Tiure, or simply Jabba the Hutt, (596 BBY - 4 ABY) is a character in the Star Wars movies. Jabba is of the Hutt race, and like most of his species, a gangster. Hutts are a large slug-like race with thick, leathery skin, human-like arms, large black... Jabba the Hutt, Watto, Sebulba is a fictional character from the Star Wars universe. Sebulba was a former slave who had bought his freedom with his incredible skills at piloting a high-speed podracer. Before long, Sebulba became the star racer of the Galactic Podracing Circuit, based not only on his formidable racing skills... Sebulba and others) and humans (most notably Anakin Skywalker (41 BBY - 4 ABY), is a fictional character from Star Wars. Anakin is played in the films by Jake Lloyd as a child, Hayden Christensen as a young adult, and Sebastian Shaw as a dying, elderly (and redeemed) person. The name Anakin means warrior. In real life, the... Anakin Skywalker in Film poster for Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace is a 1999 film by George Lucas starring Liam Neeson, Ewan McGregor, Natalie Portman, and Jake Lloyd. Menace is the first in a trilogy of films that function as a prequel to the... The Phantom Menace and Film poster for Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones (2002) is the fifth Star Wars science fiction movie released and the second part of the prequel trilogy which began with Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace. It is the... Attack of the Clones).

The Alternative meanings: Ewoks (cartoon) In the Star Wars series of films, Ewoks are sentient furred bipeds native to Endors forest moon who help the Rebel Alliance defeat the forces of the Galactic Empire in the Battle of Endor. Ewoks are curious individuals that stand about one meter tall; they... Ewoks of the In the fictional universe of Star Wars, the forest moon of Endor is a moon which is home to the Ewoks and above which the second Death Star was constructed in Return of the Jedi. Endors moon is also the location of the two Ewok TV movies The Ewok... forest moon of Endor speak a "primitive dialect" of one of the six million other forms of communication that C-3PO (also spelled See-Threepio, called 3PO for short) is a character from the fictional Star Wars universe. He is a protocol droid - an android specifically designed to interact with organics - with a very proper manner and British accent when speaking in English, though he is, fluent in over... C-3PO is familiar with, although what this language was is unknown.

Many interspecies conversations in the Star Wars universe are bilingual, with the humans usually speaking Basic and the non-humans speaking their own or a regional language. Code-switching is a term in linguistics referring to alternation between one or more languages, dialects, or language registers in the course of discourse between people who have more than one language in common. Sometimes the switch lasts only for a few sentences, or even for a single phrase. The... Code-switching is rare.

Droids and computers

Alternative meanings: Droids (cartoon) A droid is a robot, specifically the intelligent robots in the fictional Star Wars universe. Famous droids include R2-D2 and C-3PO. Less famous droids in the Star Wars saga include: 2-1B medic, EV-9D9, Federation battle droid, IG-88, Imperial probe droid, Pit... Droids (robots) and computers in Star Wars use either the natural languages that their masters use, usually Basic, or special machine languages. Protocol droids such as C-3PO are "fluent in over six million forms of communication" and are often employed as translators. A type of robot often encountered in the fictional Star Wars universe. Such robots are automated mechanics, doing many kinds of repair duties. Larger starships will usually carry a large compliment of these in case of malfunctions or combat damage, although some stub-fighters (notably the X_wing and Naboo starfighter... Astromech droids such as R2-D2 (also spelled Artoo-Detoo, called R2 for short), is an astromech droid and colleague of C-3PO in the fictional Star Wars universe. R2-D2 was played by Kenny Baker in all five Star Wars films, with many scenes filmed using mechanical versions of the character. Spoiler warning... R2-D2 are able to understand commands in Basic and perhaps other languages, but can only communicate through an information-dense language of beeps and whistles; although devices exist that can translate this language into Basic (such as the display in an X-Wing cockpit that allows the ship's astromech and pilot to communicate). Simpler droids communicate only through sounds indicating affirmative/negative, or other simple replies.

Wookiees and other aliens

A Wookiee is a member of a fictional race of hairy bipeds in the Star Wars universe. The most famous Wookiee is Chewbacca, a companion to Han Solo. Spoiler warning: Plot or ending details follow. Wookiee homeworld and natural habitat is a forest world called Kashyyyk (though some sources do... Wookiees, the most famous being Chewbacca (or Chewie) (c. 200 BBY - c. 25 ABY), a fictional character of the Star Wars universe, is an 8-foot tall Wookiee and co_pilot of Han Solos ship, the Millennium Falcon. While Chewie is perfectly able to understand the galactic-standard language Basic, he is unable to speak... Chewbacca, are physically unable to speak Galactic Basic. Their native language, Shyriiwook, consists of animalistic roars and growls. Although it can be understood by members of other species, it is extremely difficult (if not impossible) for most non-wookies to speak; presumably the word 'Shyriiwook' itself, as well as other Wookiee words or names, are transliterations of the original Wookiee sounds into a form more easily pronounced by others. In one of the novels, Her Royal Highness, Princess Leia Organa Solo of Alderaan (born 19 BBY), a fictional character in the Star Wars universe played by actress Carrie Fisher in the films and by Ann Sachs in the 1980s radio drama. Spoiler warning: Plot or ending details follow. Leia Organa is the daughter of... Leia Organa-Solo encounters a Wookiee with a Speech disorders are a type of communication disorders where normal speech is disrupted. This can mean stuttering, lisps, stammering, vocal dysphonia etc. Many of these types of disorders can be treated by speech therapy, but others require medical attention by a doctor in phoniatrics. Classifying speech into normal and disordered... speech impediment which conveniently renders his Shyriiwook pronunciation much easier to understand by Leia, who was learning the language at the time.

Another alien species with an unusual language are the insectoid ... Geonosians seen in Episode II, whose language seems to consist almost entirely of Clicks are stops produced with two articulatory closures in the oral cavity. The pocket of air enclosed between the two closures is rarefied by a sucking action of the tongue. The release of the more forward closure produces a loud and extremely salient noise. This so-called velaric airstream mechanism... Click consonants.

Writing

There is relatively little writing in the Star Wars universe; most telecommunication is by audio or audio/visual transmission. Where there is writing, such as on display screens in vehicles or occasionally on the side of a building, it is often unclear how the writing relates to the languages being used, although the Aurabesh is the alphabet commonly used to represent the English, or Basic, language in the Star Wars universe. The name comes from a combination of the first two letters, Aurek and Besh (similar to the Greek Alphabet, the first two letters being Alpha and Beta). Aurabesh is occasionally used in... Aurebesh script is claimed to be the definitive method of writing Basic.

Arabic numerals (also called Hindu numerals or Hindu-Arabic numerals) are by far the most common form of symbolism used to represent numbers. The Arabic numeral system is a positional base 10 numeral system with 10 distinct glyphs representing the 10 numerical digits. The leftmost digit of a number has... Arabic numerals do appear throughout the films, mainly on computer displays counting down time or distance. At least one instance of the The Latin alphabet, also called the Roman alphabet, is the most widely used alphabetic writing system in the world, the standard script of the English language and most of the languages of western and central Europe, and of those areas settled by Europeans. In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the... Latin alphabet crops up in This movie poster for Star Wars depicts many of the films important elements, such as Luke Skywalker, Princess Leia, Han Solo, X-Wing and Y-Wing fighters Star Wars, retitled Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope in 1981 (see note at Title,) is the original (and in chronological... A New Hope ("POWER - TRACTOR BEAM 12 (SEC. N6)"), but this appears to be an anomaly; text in the other films is either illegible, offscreen, or in fictional scripts. For the 2004 is a leap year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar. It was designated the: International Year of Rice (by the United Nations) International Year to Commemorate the Struggle against Slavery and its Abolition (by UNESCO) Elections were held in 73 countries during 2004. See a list of elections... 2004 DVD is an optical disc storage media format that is used for playback of movies with high video and sound quality and for storing data. DVDs are similar in appearance to compact discs. Two DVDs with different bottom sides. DVD pick-up head and drive. History During the early 1990s... DVD release, this writing was changed to Aurabesh is the alphabet commonly used to represent the English, or Basic, language in the Star Wars universe. The name comes from a combination of the first two letters, Aurek and Besh (similar to the Greek Alphabet, the first two letters being Alpha and Beta). Aurabesh is occasionally used in... Aurebesh, confirming that it is no longer canonical.

In the novel Spoiler warning: Plot or ending details follow. The Truce at Bakura is a 1993 science fiction novel by Kathy Tyers. It is set right after the Battle of Endor as depicted in the 1983 Star Wars film Return of the Jedi. An Imperial probe reaches the site of the battle... The Truce at Bakura, the Ssi-ruuk speak some sort of Tone refers to the use of pitch in language to distinguish words. All languages use intonation to express emphasis, emotion, or other such nuances, but not every language uses tone to distinguish meaning outright. When this occurs, tones are equally important and essential as phonemes (discrete sounds, for example, /t... tonal language which involves whistles. A human prisoner devises an orthography for this language, combining musical notation with phonetic characters; however no details are shown in the book.

Language building

The languages of some fictional worlds have been worked out in great detail, with grammatical rules and large vocabularies, such as J. R. R. Tolkien in 1916. He is wearing a WWI-era British Army uniform in this photograph. John Ronald Reuel Tolkien (January 3, 1892 – September 2, 1973) was the author of The Hobbit and its sequel The Lord of the Rings. He attended King Edwards School, Birmingham... J. R. R. Tolkien's Elvish languages are constructed languages used typically by elves in a fantasy setting. Elvish languages of Middle-earth Author J. R. R. Tolkien created many languages for Elves to complement his books set in the fictional universe of Middle-earth. His interest was primarily philological, and he said his stories... Elvish languages and the Note: This page contains phonetic information presented in the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) using Unicode. See IPA in Unicode if you have display problems. The Klingon language or Klingonese (tlhIngan Hol in Klingon) is a constructed language created by Marc Okrand for Paramount Pictures and spoken by Klingons in the... Klingon language of The Enterprise boldly went where no man had gone before. Star Trek collectively refers to six science fiction television series, ten motion pictures, and hundreds of novels, video games, and other works of fiction all set within the same fictional universe created by Gene Roddenberry in the early- to mid... Star Trek. The fictional languages of Star Wars, in contrast, are not systematically worked out. The Wookiee growls and the beeps of the astromechs mainly carry emotional indicators for the audience via intonation, and Huttese is mainly a jumble of words taken from numerous real human languages.

Other languages heard are longer chunks of actual human languages, albeit ones likely unfamiliar to most of the audience. In A New Hope, for instance, the language spoken by the character Greedo in conversation with Han Solo (in the cantina) is actually a simplified version of Quechua (Quechua, Runa Simi) is an American Indian language native to South America and related to Aymará, both members of the Quechumaran linguistic stock. It was the official language of the Tahuantinsuyu (Inca empire), and today is spoken in various dialects by some 9.6 million people throughout South America... Quechua, an indigenous language of the Andean region of South America. In Return of the Jedi, Lando Calrissian's copilot, Nien Nunb, speaks the real human language Haya, a dialect spoken in Tanzania (page 31, Star Wars Insider #67). Similarly, the Ewok language was based on The Tibetan language is typically classified as member of the Tibeto-Burman branch of the Sino-Tibetan linguistic family. It is a mildly tonal language using two to four tones depending on dialect. It is described as primarily isolating but agglutinative in some degree. It is spoken by approximately 6... Tibetan, although some fans claim that they also hear English being spoken by the Ewoks at some points during the film.

One can also hear some Finnish is spoken by the majority (92%) in Finland and by ethnic Finns outside Finland. It is an official language in Finland. Finnish is a member of the Finno-Ugric language family and is an agglutinative language which modifies the forms of both noun and adjective depending on their roles... Finnish in the Phantom Menace. After the first lap of the pod race competition, Watto yells 'Kiitos!' ('Thank You!' in Finnish) to Sebulba, and Sebulba answers 'Ole hyvä!' ('You're Welcome!' in Finnish).

Despite these inconsistences however, a language guide to the most common Star Wars languages such as Huttese and Bocce exists: The Intergalactic Language and Travel Guide, which collects much of the data given in the books and movies surrounding the saga.